Publications

Peak-flow (flood) frequency analysis is essential to water-resources management applications, including the design of critical infrastructure such as bridges and culverts, and floodplain mapping. Federal guidelines for performing peak-flow flood frequency analyses are presented in a U.S. Geological Survey Techniques and Methods Report known as Bulletin 17C. A basic assumption within Bulletin 17C,

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in partnership with the International Joint Commission installed and operated continuous water-quality monitors at three sites on the Souris River from May 2019 to October 2023. Continuously recorded data included dissolved oxygen (DO), water temperature, and specific conductance at the Souris River near Sherwood, North Dakota (USGS station 05114000), Souris River

Expanding coal-mining operations in the Elk River Valley (British Columbia, Canada) have increased total selenium (Se) concentrations in the transboundary Lake Koocanusa (Canada and United States), but the spatial extent of Se transport from the Elk River Mines is unknown. We evaluated multiple lines of evidence of long-range transport of Se at five sites downstream of the mines relative to a site

Analysis of 70 years of snowfall in the Northern Hemisphere reveals that snow buffers the effect of varying precipitation levels on streamflow. The link highlights the need to rethink water-resource management as snow levels decline.

Flood-frequency analysis, also called peak-flow frequency or flood-flow frequency analysis, is essential to water resources management applications including critical structure design and floodplain mapping. Federal guidelines for doing flood-frequency analyses are presented in a U.S. Geological Survey Techniques and Methods report known as Bulletin 17C. A basic assumption within Bulletin 17C is t

Flood-frequency analysis, also called peak-flow frequency or flood-flow frequency analysis, is essential to water resources management applications including critical structure design and floodplain mapping. Federal guidelines for doing flood-frequency analyses are presented in a U.S. Geological Survey Techniques and Methods Report known as Bulletin 17C. A basic assumption within Bulletin 17C is t

The Flood Risk Management Project was initiated in 2008 in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area to reduce flood risk, flood damages, and flood protection costs in the Fargo-Moorhead metropolitan area. In cooperation with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Geological Survey initiated a water-quality monitoring study to describe the water-quality characteristics of the Red River of the North

In stream systems, disentangling relationships between biology and flow and subsequent prediction of these relationships to unsampled streams is a common objective of large-scale ecological modeling. Often, streamflow metrics are derived from aggregating continuous streamflow records available at a subset of stream gages into long-term flow regime descriptors. Despite demonstrated value, shortcomi

The Souris River Basin is an international basin in southeast Saskatchewan, north-central North Dakota, and southwest Manitoba. Sustained exceedances of water-quality objectives for total phosphorus, sodium, sulfate, total dissolved solids, and total iron have been reported since the late 1990s at the two binational sites on the Souris River (Souris River near Sherwood, North Dakota [U.S. Geologic

Knowing subsurface drainage (tile-drain) extent is integral to understanding how landscapes respond to precipitation events and subsequent days of drying, as well as how soil characteristics and land management influence stream response. Consequently, a time series of tile-drain extent would inform one aspect of land management that complicates our ability to explain streamflow and water-quality a

Researchers routinely study streamflow data to understand the effects of natural climate variability and anthropogenic climate change, and to develop methods for estimating streamflow at ungaged locations. These studies require streamflow data that are not modified or largely altered by other anthropogenic activities, such as reservoirs or diversions. This report discusses a method for identifying

Flood-frequency analysis is essential in numerous water-resource management applications, including critical structure design and flood-plain mapping. A basic assumption within Bulletin 17C [1], the standardized guidelines for conducting flood-frequency analysis, is that basins without major hydrologic alterations, such as regulation or urbanization, exhibit stationary statistical properties of th